


The Hunt Begins

by Llama1412



Series: The Outlaws [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Episode Related, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-02
Updated: 2013-01-02
Packaged: 2017-11-23 10:04:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/620916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Llama1412/pseuds/Llama1412
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the episode Vendetta, Helena contemplates her next move and is confronted by a man wearing a suit and a mask.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hunt Begins

The sky had long since gone dark by the time she guided her motorcycle off the road and into the dirt lot serving as a parking lot for the rundown old bar. The inside looked about as bad as the outside, but the place was in the middle of nowhere, so she wasn't really expecting much. It didn't matter anyway. She didn't need the good service that so often accompanied her father’s name. All she wanted was a place where no one knew her, no one cared who she might be. This was the perfect place for that.

She sat down in the far corner of the bar, dropping her bag onto the floor with little care for the contents. Did it matter if that crossbow Queen had given her got damaged? She preferred the “emotion and unpredictability” of guns, as Queen had called them. She kicked her bag. What did she care what Queen thought? The self-righteous vigilante could think whatever he wanted. He couldn't stop her from doing what was needed, what was right.

For a brief moment, she considered whether she should burn the costume Queen had designed. But why bother? The costume was durable and it suited her, and if Queen wanted it back, she would enjoy denying him. But it was -her- costume now. Not Queen’s, not the Star City Vigilante’s, but her’s. Helena Bertinelli’s. No, not Bertinelli, not her father’s name. Just Helena, then, or perhaps some other name. A name to make the scourge of the Earth fear her the moment they saw her costume, saw the gun she carried. A name that made them know that she was coming for them, she was hunting them down.

She grasped her drink, smirking against the rim. She would hunt them down, and they would learn to fear her.

\--

She had been sitting in a shadowed table of the bar for longer than she’d been keeping track. Helena had meant to stay only a short period of time before taking back to the road and returning to her hunt, but long hours of traveling and burning, angry thoughts about Queen had left her fatigued. There was no harm in lingering here, in this run-down bar where no one cared who she was and what her father had done.

“Another drink?”

She glanced to acknowledge a man standing next to her table. He wore a casual suit and a hat, drawn low to shadow his face. Suspicious. Or maybe he was just another person, yearning for anonymity. “That depends on who’s offering.” Even so, she signaled the barman for another round.

“Ah. That is the question, isn't it?” The chair scraped against the floor as he pulled it out and sat, despite the lack of invitation. She frowned at him, but before she could say anything, he continued. “A better question is why the heir to such a… shall we say, unique? legacy seeking the blood of those similar?”

She froze. “What are you talking about?”

“I know who you are, Helena Bertinelli. I know what you have done. The question is, why fight your birthright? Why fight against your father’s men and men like them?”

Helena slammed her hands on the table. “Who are you?” she hissed.

He cocked his head and the shadows under the brim of his hat were chased away, only to reveal the blank white of a cloth mask. “I am the Question. I pursue the Answers.”

She scoffed and the barman finally stumbled over to her table and plopped down two pints. He backed up to give her a smile and his eyes lighted upon her faceless companion. The bartender gave a short yell and stumbled backwards, drawing all the room’s attention upon herself and ‘the Question’.

“‘Ey, what’s the meaning of this? Ge’ out of here, yer scarin’ the customers!” As far as Helena could see, the only one frightened was the bartender himself, but when the man swung beefy arms at the Question, the strange man ducked out of the way and scurried towards the door.

“You still haven’t Answered the Question” was his parting remark. She glared as the wooden door swung shut behind him with a bang.

Who was he? How could he have known all that? Recognizing her, sure, that wasn't beyond understanding, but knowing that she’d been targeting her father’s men? Her father and Queen were the only ones alive to know that. Had she failed to notice another witness? Or was that guy some creep Queen had hired to try to — what? What would Queen even want with her? To stop her? Surely he was more intelligent than that. A huntress like herself could not be stopped and it was in the best interest of his fight against corruption to leave her be. Was there someone else ‘the Question’ could be working for? Her father… no, any servant to Frank Bertinelli would have killed her straight away, and any witnesses who were unlucky enough to cross their path. So who was the Question?

She growled under her breath and pulled the two pints the barman had left towards her. The attention of the bar’s patrons had long since been diverted to the pool tables in the center or to their own affairs. “He better have paid for these.” She shot a look at the door and began downing the drinks. Her stop at this bar was supposed to be a reprieve, a break before the hunt started again. It was not supposed to be plagued by creeps like the Question.

—

Two hours and far too much contemplation later, Helena was feeling much too sober for the amount of money she’d wasted on alcohol. Regardless, her reprieve had passed and tomorrow, a messenger from the Triad was expected to make contact with the local crime bosses in Gotham and she intended to be there to intercept him.

She slung her bag over the seat of her motorcycle and dug out her helmet. “To Gotham, then?” A voice spoke behind her.

She whirled around, gun in hand, to see the man calling himself the Question. “What?”

He seemed relatively unbothered by the gun trained at his chest. “Assuming you have access to a reasonable amount of information to make your quest worthwhile, you must know of the correspondence that has taken place between the Triad and certain Gotham criminals. Considering your past victims have included a number of Triad members, it was not unreasonable to expect you to take this road to Gotham.”

“You were waiting for me. In the bar, you were expecting me.”

“Ah, finally you’re answering the right questions.” The Question nodded.

“Why? Why were you waiting for me? Want do you want with me?” Question took a step closer and she cocked her gun.

He raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Human beings are corrupt. You are trying to rid us of the worst of that corruption. That is an objective I find worthy. I am skilled in information gathering and in hand-to-hand combat. You may find me to be an asset.”

Helena gaped at him.

“I would like to help you, if you’ll have me.”


End file.
